Jorge Quesada Sánchez studied Chemical Engineering at the University of Oviedo, where he graduated in 2013. In 2014, he completed a Master's in Energy Engineering with a Retention of Young Talents scholarship awarded by the university itself. He then obtained his PhD in Chemical Engineering in 2018, with an international mention and an extraordinary award, under the supervision of Professors Laura Faba and Eva Díaz, in the Catalysis, Reactors, and Control research group, with Professor Salvador Ordóñez as the principal investigator.
He began his research in catalysis in 2013, at the end of his studies in Chemical Engineering, with a Research Introduction Scholarship in Catalysis from the Spanish Society of Catalysis. During his doctoral dissertation, focused on the valorization of ethanol and acetone through catalytic processes, he significantly contributed to the understanding of the active sites needed for reactions of aldol condensation, hydrogenation/dehydrogenation, and dehydration-cyclization, using heterogeneous acidic, acid-basic, and bifunctional catalysts. After completing his PhD, he worked as a postdoctoral researcher (2018-2019) at the University of Oviedo, continuing under the supervision of Professor Salvador Ordóñez, focusing on developing catalytic strategies to produce arenes from acetone. During this period, he also participated in teaching tasks in the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, teaching courses in the undergraduate and master’s programs in Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology.
In 2020, he joined University of California, Berkeley (USA) as a postdoctoral researcher, under the supervision of Professor Enrique Iglesia, at the Laboratory for the Science and Applications of Catalysis. His initial research (2020-2021) focused on the solvation effects on transition states that mediate elementary steps in alkene dimerization reactions on Brønsted acid sites of aluminosilicates. In 2021, he was awarded a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Fellowship (Individual Fellowship, 2021-2024), which enabled him to develop an individual project (2021-2023) focused on the metathesis of alkenes over Mo oxides dispersed on silica. In 2023, he moved to the Leibniz Institute for Catalysis (LIKAT) in Rostock (Germany), where he expanded his knowledge in homogeneous catalysis in the Applied Homogeneous Catalysis Department. There, he worked on the production of linear alkylbenzenes through alkene hydroarylation reactions using Ni carbene (NHC) complexes, under the supervision of Professor Matthias Beller. In 2024, he returned to the University of Oviedo, where he conducted research on the immobilization of molecular catalysts on surfaces to develop heterogeneous catalysts for the formation of linear alkylbenzenes in alkene hydroarylation reactions.
Since September 2024, Jorge Quesada Sánchez has been an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemical, Energy, and Mechanical Technology at the Rey Juan Carlos University, where he continues his academic career.